Leadership

Incoming Moore President Cathy Young

Cathy Young is the eleventh president of Moore College of Art & Design. She brings more than 35 years of experience as a choreographer, arts educator, academic leader, and entrepreneurial artist to her role at the nation's first and only historically all-women's college for art and design.

Young grew up on a farm in a central Pennsylvania coal mining town. She earned her BA in sociology and women’s studies magna cum laude from Harvard University, where she was first exposed to dance as an art form. Having fallen in love with dance for its physicality, communicative power, and ability to create community, she made the decision to pursue it professionally, leaving former dreams of law school behind and embracing the joys and challenges of a life as a performing artist.

Young spent the next 20 years building a national and international career as a dancer, choreographer, artistic director and dance educator. She returned to academia to earn her MFA in dance at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, and became a tenured associate professor of dance at Ursinus College, where she cofounded the dance program, and chaired the Theater and Dance Department.

From 2011–2017, Young led the dance division at Boston Conservatory as dean. Her emphasis on diversity, innovation, collaboration and community as core values attracted the top students, faculty, and guest artists in the field. She revamped the program, implementing a comprehensive and forward-thinking curriculum designed to prepare students for 21st-century entrepreneurial dance careers. Under her leadership, the dance division at Boston Conservatory became recognized as the top contemporary dance program in the United States. 

In 2017, Young was named to the dual role of senior vice president of Berklee and executive director of Boston Conservatory at Berklee, following a national search to replace the former president, and charged with leading the Conservatory through the highly complex merger with Berklee College of Music. Young developed a strategic plan for the Conservatory which aimed to reinvent conservatory education through large-scale innovation of curriculum, pedagogy and delivery of degree programs, with diversity as the central driver of curricular, artistic and cultural change. Under her leadership, the Conservatory made significant progress toward these goals including enrollment growth; strong philanthropic momentum resulting in increased scholarship support for students; an increasingly diverse student, faculty, and staff population; and academic innovation, including the launch of technology curriculum for all first-year students, development of online courses, and the launch of an innovative three-year, six-semester BFA program.

In February 2022, Young was unanimously confirmed as president by Moore College of Art & Design's Board of Trustees, following a comprehensive national search led by a 13-member, Board-appointed search committee. She officially joined the Moore community on June 30, 2022.

Photo by Dave Rizzio.

Moore Boards of Managers & Trustees

Board List as of July 1, 2022

  • Marta Adelson, Board of Managers
  • Tim Andrews, Board of Managers
  • Arthur R. Block, Chair, Board of Managers
  • Kendyl Boyd ’21, Board of Managers
  • Louisa Falcione, Board of Managers
  • Penny Fox, Chair Emerita, Board of Trustees
  • Mindy Glassman ’72, Board of Managers
  • Frances Graham ’66, Chair, Board of Trustees
  • Janie Gross ’74, Board of Managers
  • Carolina Marín Hernández ’22, Board of Managers
  • Mary Jennings ’88, Ex-Officio Alumni Council Representative, Board of Managers
  • Meg Johnson, Board of Managers
  • Ted Kapnek, Board of Managers
  • Rochelle “Cissie” Levy ’79, Chair Emerita, Board of Trustees
  • Kathleen Lister ’78, Board of Managers
  • Leslie London, Esq., Board of Managers
  • Margaret Marsh, PhD, Board of Trustees
  • Lynn Palewicz, Ex-Officio Faculty Representative, Board of Managers
  • Tim Patterson, Board of Trustees
  • Robert Rosenberg, Board of Managers
  • Adele Schaeffer, Board of Trustees
  • Shelley Smith, Secretary, Board of Managers
  • Joan N. Stern, Esq., Vice Chair, Board of Trustees
  • Lauren Stichter, Ex-Officio Faculty Forum Representative, Board of Managers
  • Keith Straw, Board of Managers
  • Kia Weatherspoon ’10, Board of Managers

Cathy Young, President, Ex-Officio
William L. Hill II, Treasurer, Ex-Officio
Alysson Cwyk, Assistant Secretary, Ex-Officio


John J. Donnelly, Trustee Emeritus*
Richard W. Hevner, Trustee Emeritus*
Jane Walentas ‘66, Trustee Emerita*
Penelope P. Wilson, Trustee Emerita*

Cecelia Fitzgibbon, President Emerita
Happy Fernandez, President Emerita*
Mary-Linda Armacost, President Emerita

*deceased